Blogging Beowulf: Fit XLI, Lines 2946–3057

15 May 2009

The fit continues the herald’s account of the Swedish war. Ongentheow, the Swedish king, and his troops flee from Hygelac’s oncoming army, taking refuge in a fort. Hygelac overruns the fort and Ongentheow faces two Geatish warriors, brothers, in battle, Wulf and Eofor. Wulf wounds Ongentheow, but Ongentheow’s counterstroke cuts through Wulf’s helmet, severely wounding, but not killing, the warrior. Eofor, Wulf’s brother steps into the fray and kills Ongentheow. Eofor takes Ongentheow’s armor and weapons and presents them to Hygelac as trophies. In return, Hygelac richly rewards the brothers with treasure and gives his only daughter in marriage to Eofor.

The herald predicts that with the death of Beowulf, the Swedes will renew the feud with the Geats. The herald says that they must burn the dragon’s hoard with Beowulf’s body and predicts a grim future for the people of the Geats. The warriors then go to view Beowulf’s body, the dead dragon, and the treasure.

This is a very difficult fit for the modern reader because it’s filled with references that, while familiar to the Anglo-Saxons, are obscure to us. The large number of characters also makes it difficult to connect pronouns to their antecedents. (e.g., Does “his” refer to Eofor, Hygelac, or Ongentheow?) But with repeated readings, you can eventually figure it all out, and the reward is well worth it. The fit has several really evocative passages.

First some names. Eofor literally means boar and Wulf is, of course, wolf.

The battle scenes are marvelously descriptive, lines 2964b–76:

                        Hyne yrringa
Wulf Wonrēding      wæpne ġeræhte,
þæt him for swenġe      swāt ædrum sprong
forð under fexe.      Næs hē forht swā ðēh,
gomela Scilfing,      ac forġeald hraðe
wyrsan wrixle      wælhlem þone,
syððan ðēodcyning      þyder onċirde.
Ne meahte se snella      sunu Wonrēdes
ealdum ċeorle      ondslyht ġiofan,
ac hē him on hēafde      helm ær ġescer,
þæt hē blōde fah      būgan sceolde,
fēoll on foldan;      næs hē fæġe þā ġit,
ac hē hyne ġewyrpte,      þēah ðe him wund hrine.

                        Angrily
Wulf, the son of Wonred,   struck him1 with his weapon
so that because of the swing      blood sprang in streams
from under his hair.      Yet he1 was not afraid,
the old Scilfing,      but he repaid quickly
a worse exchange      for that slaughter-blow,
after the people’s king      turned thither.
The bold son of Wonred      could not
give a counter-blow      to the old man,
because he1 had sheared through      the helmet on his2 head,
so that he decorated with blood      should fall,
he fell to the ground;   he was not yet doomed to die,
but he recovered,      though the wound had hurt him.

1 Ongentheow
2 Wulf

Ædrum, which I translated as in streams, could also be from veins. I’ve also moved some of the words about so the passage conforms to modern rules of syntax.

The herald also explains why the treasure should be burned and predicts dark times ahead for the Geats, lines 3010–27:

                        Ne scel ānes hwæt
meltan mid þam modigan,      ac þær is māðma hord,
gold unrīme      grimme ġeċēa(po)d,
ond nū æt sīðestan      sylfes fēore
bēagas (ġeboh)te;      þā sceall brond fretan,
æled þeċċean—      nalles eorl wegan
māððum to ġemyndum,      nē mæġð scyne
habban on healse      hrinġweorðunge,
ac sceal ġeōmormōd,      golde berēafod,
oft nalles æne      elland tredan,
nū se herewīsa      hleahtor āleġde,
gamen ond glēodrēam.      Forðon sceall gār wesan
moniġ, morgenċeald,      mundum bewunden,
hæfen on handa,      nalles hearpan swēġ
wīġend weċċean,      ac se wonna hrefn
fūs ofer fæġum      fela reordian,
earne secgan      hū him æt æte spēow,
þenden hē wið wulf      wæl rēafode.

                        Nor shall just one thing
melt with the courageous one,      but there is the treasure hoard,
gold uncounted      and grimly purchased,
and now at last      with his own life
bought the rings;      then shall the fire devour,
the fire enfold—      the warrior should not wear at all
treasure in remembrance,      nor the beautiful maiden
have on her neck      ring-ornaments,
but shall sad of mind,      bereft of gold,
more than once      tread in a foreign country,
now that our war-chief      has laid aside laughter,
amusement and revelry.   Therefore shall the spear be
on many a cold morning,      grasped by hands,
hefted in hands,      not at all the sound of the harp
wake the warrior,      but the dark raven
eager for carrion      speak much,
and ask the eagle      how he succeeded at the feast,
when he with the wolf      plundered those slain in battle.

The image of women elland tredan, or treading in foreign lands, is a reference to the women of the Geats being sold into slavery. The reference to spears being grasped in morgenċeald, or on cold mornings, is two the Anglo-Saxon trope of bad things happening at dawn. A battle in the cold morning is one that is not going to go well. And the beasts of war, the raven, the eagle, and the wolf, is a standard trope, appearing in many Old English passages about war and battle.

Blogging Beowulf: Fit XL, Lines 2892–945

14 May 2009

A herald announces the death of Beowulf to the other warriors and predicts hard times for the Geats. They will be beset by the Franks, who fought a war with them when Hygelac was king, and by the Swedes, who are still angry over that war. The herald goes into some detail about the Swedish war and how Ongentheow, the Swedish king, was particularly ruthless in battle with the Geats. Ongentheow killed Hæthcyn, the king of the Geats, and had beseiged the survivors of the battle when Hygelac, Hæthcyn’s brother, came to their aid.

This fit is short, but it is challenging to read. It jumps around in time, with events in three different periods and it assumes the reader is familiar with the wars in question, with references that are obscure to the modern reader. The language is fairly straightforward, with no long passages of elevated prose or, by this point, new words.

But there are some neat turns of phrase. One is in line 2904 when Beowulf is described as sexbennum sēoc, or sick with dagger wounds. The sex- is the same word as seax, the short stabbing sword.

The survivors of battle are called sweorda lāfe, or the leavings of swords in line 2936. And in lines 2939–41, Ongentheow threatens the sweorda lāfe:

Cwæð, hē on merġenne      mēċes ecgum
ġētan wolde,      sum’ on galgtrēowu[m]
[fuglum] tō gamene.

(He said that in the morning      with the edges of swords
[he] would gut [them],      [and hang] some on the gallows-tree
for the amusement of birds.)

A lovely image, that.

Blogging Beowulf: Fit XXXIX, Lines 2821–891

13 May 2009

Wiglaf watches Beowulf die, and the narrator opines on the life and death of the dragon. Eventually the other men who had fled return and see the body of their dead king. Wiglaf speaks to them, telling them of the fight and his, by his own modest account, small part in it, and castigates them severely for running away.

The passage describing the dragon is a neat one, lines 2826b–35:

                        Bēahhordum lenġ
wyrm wōhbogen      wealdan ne mōste,
ac hine īrenna      ecga fornāmon,
hearde, heaðoscearpe      homera lāfe,
þæt se wīdfloga      wundum stille
hrēas on hrūsan      hordærne nēah.
Nalles æfter lyfte      lācende hwearf
middelnihtum,      māðmæhta wlonc
ansyn ywde,      ac hē eorðan gefēoll
for ðæs hildfruman      hondġeweorce.

(                        The ring-hoard
the coiled worm      could no longer rule,
but him the iron      edges took away,
hard, battle-sharp      leavings of hammers,
so that the wide-flier      still with wounds
fell to the ground      near the treasure house.
Afterward he no more in the sky      flying about
in the middle of the night,      proud of his treasure
showed his face,      but he fell to earth
because of the war-chief’s      handiwork.)

Homera lāfe, literally the leavings of hammers, is a marvelous kenning for swords, the product of a smithy.

The ten who fled are treated less kindly than the dragon, lines 2845b–51:

                        Næs ðā lang to ðon
þæt ðā hildlatan      holt ofġēfan,
tydre trēowlogan      tyne ætsomne,
ðā ne dorston ær      dareðum lācan
on hyra mandryhtnes      miclan þearfe;
ac hy scamiende      scyldas bæran,
gūðġewædu      þær se gomela læġ.

(                        It was not long before
the ones late to battle      left the woods,
the craven traitors      ten altogether,
who dared not earlier      to brandish their spears
in their liege-lord’s      great need;
but they being ashamed      bore their shields,
their war-gear      to where the old man lay dead.)

This is the only use of daroþ, spear, in the poem. (There are lots of synonyms, notably gar, which are used.) Daroþ is from the same root as our modern dart, but the modern word is a borrowing from Old French. Its use here is undoubtedly to alliterate with dorston.

Finally, the fit ends with a summary of what will befall those who ran away, lines 2884-91:

Nū sceal sinċþego      ond swyrdġifu,
eall ēðelwyn      ēowrum cynne,
lufen ālicgean;      londrihtes mōt
þære mæġburge      monna æġhwylċ
īdel hweorfan,      syððan æðelingas
feorran ġefricgean      flēam ēowerne,
dōmlēasan dæd.      Dēað bið sēlla
eorla ġehwylcum      þonne edwītlīf!”

(Now shall the receiving of treasure      and sword-giving,
all the homeland joys      of your people,
gladness will cease;      of the land-rights
of their kinsmen      every man
will go deprived,      when noblemen
from afar learn of      your flight,
[your] inglorious deed.      Death is better
for any earl      than a life of shame!)

If you’ve ever wondered where the phrase death before dishonor comes from, this is it.

Blogging Beowulf: Fit XXXVIII, Lines 2752–820

12 May 2009

Wiglaf enters the dragon’s barrow and carries out a wealth of treasure to lay at the dying Beowulf’s feet. The treasure is great, but also mouldering, rusty, and uncared for. Beowulf commands Wiglaf to build a monument to him at the place of his funeral pyre, and gives Wiglaf, his only relative, his arms and armor. Then Beowulf dies.

This fit is significant in that Beowulf dies at the end of it, but it’s fairly unremarkable as far as the language goes. There are no new vocabulary or constructions of significance.

Wiglaf sees the treasure in the barrow, lines 2756–64a:

Ġeseah ðā sigehrēðiġ,      þā hē bī sesse ġēong,
magoþeġn mōdiġ      māððumsiġla fealo,
gold glitinian      grunde ġetenġe,
wundur on wealle,      ond þæs wyrmes denn,
ealdes ūhtflogan,      orcas stondan,
fyrnmanna fatu      feormendlēase,
hyrstum behrorene;      þær wæs helm moniġ
eald ond ōmiġ,      earmbēaga fela
searwum ġesæled.

(The victorious one saw,      when he went by the seat,
the brave young retainer      many precious jewels,
glittering gold      lying on the ground,
wonders on the walls,      and the den of the worm,
the old dawn-flier,      cups standing,
vessels of ancient men      without a polisher,
ornaments deprieved;      there was many a helmet
old and rusty,      many arm-rings
with twisted decorations.)

Beowulf’s last words are, lines 2813–20:

“Þū eart endelāf      ūsses cynnes,
Wæġmundinga;      ealle wyrd forswēop
mīne māgas      tō metodsceafte,
eorlas on elne;      iċ him æfter sceal.”
Þæt wæs þām gomelan      ġinġæste word
brēostġehyġdum,      ær hē bæl cure,
hāte heaðowylmas;      him of hreðre ġewāt
sāwol sēċean      sōðfæstra dōm.

(“You are the last remnant      of our people,
the Wægmundings;      fate has swept away all
my kinsmen      to their appointed destiny,
the valor of the warriors;      I must follow them.”
that was from the old man      the last word
the thoughts of his heart,      before he chose the pyre
the hot, hostile flames;      from his heart went
his soul to seek      the judgment of the righteous.)

Review: Slang: the People’s Poetry

12 May 2009

Slang: the People’s Poetry is a new book by Michael Adams of Indiana University. It’s a thorough overview of slang, what it is, who uses it, how it is created, how it dies, its aesthetics, and how it affects the way we think. There are lots of slang dictionaries and glossaries, but few have dared take on the subject in a comprehensive and rigorous manner. This is the first such overview published in many years.

Slang is a tricky subject; even defining it poses challenges. Yet Adams takes on this rather daunting subject with aplomb and scholarly rigor. I highly recommend the book for anyone looking for a serious discussion of slang. This is not a “fun read” or a “joyous romp through our language” or [insert cliché here that is used to describe a lightweight book]. It’s an intellectual discussion and overview of a serious linguistic topic.

Serious, but not dull. It’s not a “fun read,” but that doesn’t mean it isn’t fun to read. There’s lots of subtle humor and word play buried in the pages. And while the treatment of the subject is scholarly in approach, Adams does not write with the mind-numbing academic style that is typical of much of academic discourse. You don’t need a background in linguistics to follow the discussion. And, as one would expect from a book on slang, it is filled with marvelous and inventive examples of the art of slang, from sources as diverse as Dickens to Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

If you have anything more than a passing interest in slang and language, Slang: the People’s Poetry is for you.

2009, Oxford University Press
Hardcover, 256 pages
$23.95